It was Internet wag Billy Beck who coined that term (or at least popularized it) some years ago. Lorenzo Warby more recently styles it as Post-Enlightenment Progressivism. Going back to the 19th century, Nietzsche saw the descent into nihilism, and what he termed The Last Man.
Many people, left and right, express a nostalgia for the 1950s America; they are of course being highly selective in that nostalgia. Both sides love the afterglow of being the victors of WWII, even as the nascent American global role was a repudiation of our very founding (in favor of the old European diplomatic tradition). The left views the economic equality of that era as unsurpassed (as they obsess on our inequality now). The right pines for the vibrancy (and conformity) of family and community in that time. The left of course ignores that the Democrats of the ‘50s were the last kings of Jim Crow; and that this was all pre-Medicare/Medicaid (and Great Society), and the social norms were stultifying. The right ignores that our economic supremacy was based on being the only untouched industrial power coming out of WWII, and that short-term profit mentality would lead to long-term decline; that Korea was to be inevitably followed by Viet Nam. Of course fewer and fewer people find any personal relevance to the 50s - which allows them to accept ever less realistic perspectives on it.
Prophesy is a tough business, you’re almost certain to be wrong - at least in the nearer term; you may get vindication long term, but you won’t be around to enjoy it. The surest way to be wrong is commit yourself to some system of thought and become a prisoner of the prejudices built in to that system. You will furiously resist any attempt from within or without to bend open the bars and explore what’s on the other side. We can think of some recent examples: The End of History, The Emerging Democratic Majority, and of course the indestructible The Population Bomb. My favorite is still Norman Angell’s The Great Illusion which was published just a few years before World War I - which would catastrophically disprove it’s thesis.
This doesn’t stop people from imagining a future entirely unlike the past. This is most common among those who have decided the past is the primary source of evil in the present, and the only remedy for that is total rejection of that in favor of some glorious vision (that always gets a little hazy when you look at it closely).1 That omits a lot of hard problems - starting with how, and not even considering - how can you know (or more properly, believe) in what that future will actually be. Your only reference is Not Like Now, and Not Like The Past, with a caveat on that second condition; that often, the desire is to recreate some equally imaginary past golden age - thus becoming a redemption story in the process. This works with or without God being in the equation - which should be an important clue to those who place God’s presence (or absence) as central to their vision. Redemption of mankind (again, with or without God) is a very powerful narrative for nearly all humans, and it works in various forms and without being anything close to truthful. Rousseau wanted mankind redeemed from corrupting civilization; Marxists from capitalist oppression; post-Marxists from oppression from all sources but materialist. Nietzsche was a little different - his story wasn’t about redemption but about transcendence, but that too was to escape decadence and nihilism.
Thomas Sowell’s The Vision of the Anointed is perhaps the best reality check you could hope for, which of course is why those filled with hubris have no interest in it. It serves a similar purpose as The True Believer - it gives you the things you need to watch for to guard against falling for a beautiful story from charismatic leadership. The sad part is, how few people are willing to engage themselves critically rather than emotionally. It is far easier to manipulate people based on emotions, and most people are willing to be thus manipulated (as long as it doesn’t push them out of their comfort zone too fast). What is interesting about Sowell’s book is in both the title and the text: the Anointed. This was once a purely religious concept, but that messianic zeal is as apparent in the secular as it ever was in the spiritual domain - the only difference is that the secular are self-anointed. The belief in being in essence a supreme being, of having the rightful place over all of mankind, is the fundamental reality and might equally be called the summit of hubris.2
The Enlightenment itself, when seriously contemplated was never as widespread as we might tend to think. The vast majority of people that have lived under the influence of it, are not strong adherents to the principles that are the animating precepts of it. The vast majority of people simply don’t want to think as hard as is required to work out what matters and why. Thus the question is how do we develop an elite that does take this seriously, not just what was good about the Enlightenment - but what was bad. Reason is a wonderful tool for humans to use, but it can’t ever define a meaningful life. The Enlightenment elevation of reason to the forefront of human life was a mistake, and we are living the consequences of that today. We are likely to retreat to some earlier organizing principle when the decay of the Enlightenment is complete. From that tumult, hopefully will emerge some new organizing concept, but the Enlightenment itself depended on the preceding Renaissance and Reformation (and that all coming hundreds of years after the fall of what to that point had been the pinnacle of civilization). That is a lot of social churn before widespread benefit. It does make me glad I am old enough I won’t live to see it - despite that I would love to see a better future ultimately evolve. There is no guarantee though that will happen; there is no linear history, no steady progression, no arc bending toward some ideal end-state. It will take the blood, toil, tears and sweat of humans dedicated to creating that - not based on pure imagination, but on the ground reality of our species; on the actual history - replete with contingency, circumstance and chance. We live in a chaotic universe and only we define the order that we bring to it; that order will always be subject to the onslaughts of chaos.3
If this sounds vaguely familiar - just think of heaven, and no religious text paints as detailed a picture of Paradise as the Koran.
One of the aspects of Zarathustra that I find most intriguing is that Nietzsche doesn’t portray him as a conquering hero, but as a figure of transcendence. This is a rather stark contrast with Nietzsche’s ideas about morality - that it is all based on dominance.
Those currently undermining Western culture aren’t really doing so for the betterment of the world (despite their own delusions to that effect). They are engineering chaos by destroying order. They are unable to create order, because lets face it - that’s hard and they aren’t up to the task.